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Shippers.

The maritime industry makes much of its money on foreign-aid shipments, courtesy of the Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Agency for International Development. Mariners have watched funding slip in recent years and are poised to lose more amid Congress’s fist-clench on spending, a conservative backlash on foreign aid and a push for alternative ways to assist developing countries.

The success of the industry lies in the continued authorization of these programs with the farm bill looming before the Senate this week.

“There is a real and tangible movement to go away from American commodities,” said Bryant Gardner, a maritime lawyer who specializes in the subject. “Their elimination or scaling down would be disastrous for the U.S. merchant marine and sealift capabilities, as well as the fight against food insecurity.”

These ships haul more than 2 million tons of food aid a year everywhere from Burkina Faso to East Timor. A longtime law requires most of the cargo move on American-registered ships.

A report prepared in 2010 for USA Maritime estimated that transporting foreign assistance goods to American ports and then abroad affected more than 13,000 jobs and created almost $2 billion in output for U.S. industries. The largest international food-aid program, once known simply as Public Law 480 and now as Food for Peace, provides exports to markets as both donations and low-interest loans.

The Senate’s farm bill extends the program for the next five years but pulls $40 million a year from shipments to go toward cash grants and the purchase of food in local markets. It also redistributes some costs.

“Our goal is not to guarantee groups the same amount of taxpayer money that they got in the last farm bill,” Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) told reporters Monday. “It’s about giving people tools to work with.” She said the bipartisan bill had the 60 votes it needs to pass the Senate but hedged on how it would play out afterward. “It’s common knowledge there is a different approach in the House,” she said.

Shippers worry even more about the House’s response, especially since members have called for the virtual elimination of Food for Peace. And it’s tough to gauge the prevailing mood because the House has yet to tackle its yearly agriculture budget.

But it’s possible to guess.

The program’s annual appropriations already have dropped from $2.3 billion in 2009 to $1.46 billion this year. A Senate subcommittee has voted to maintain that level and a House subcommittee will consider its amount Wednesday. A draft bill would drop funding to $1.15 billion.